If I remember right there was also a discussion about if and if so to which extend the operators of OC could be held responsible if a member would really commit the act of suicide. I think you should research or even ask a lawyer about such a scenario.

Otherwise I would say you need to evaluate (if there is enough material about the member) if there is a chance that the said post should be taken seriously or as a hoax.

The next step would be to write the member. Maybe prepare a note.

I am sorry if I may sound a bit cold here. But that is about all you can do. You are in no way schooled or prepared to handle such situations. Also this is an occult forum. No suicide forum. Nobady of the mod team can really be held responsible for not being able to see if a suicide post is real or only a fake.

All you can do is take EVERY such incidence as real, and prepare a protocol. Whcih would maybe even mean to send the data provided for the person to legal authorites so you can not be hold responsible for any actions following.

But again, you should contact a lawyer if this is soemthign which would need to be taken care of.

We aren't equipped to diagnose or treat mental illness, so all we can do is either nothing or pass the ball.

We can provide suicide prevention hotline/websites.

If we can discover someone's identity, should we contact authorities if we think it is a credible threat? There are issues to consider here.

For one thing, it may do more harm than good. Depending on location, calling the police in might be a death sentence by itself. It could also lead to worsening personal circumstances, such as the government taking away the individual's custody of their children, etc.

For another, this may be a safe place for someone- that is, a place they are free to say what is on their mind, and if we send in The Man for any reason, ever, it might have a chilling effect- which would actually make the problem worse by simply hiding it. It might just be talk, not planned action.

Personally I'm leaning towards "here are some websites to check out, do not kill yourself stupid there are always other solutions" and leaving it at that.

This is a postcard sent from the dining room of the HMS Russel's Teapot. Wish you were here- the band is spot on tonight, and we're having "all the way down" turtle soup!

I think the moderators should monitor the replies because if someone says something along the lines of "just do it then" ,that is not acceptable as is incitement to them to kill themselves.That's what I was trying to say in the other thread but maybe I said it too obliquly.

It's really hard to come up with any kind of policy concerning this, and I am oh so tempted to take a cowardly approach and just avoid this thread altogether.. but.. the mod team has, as always, upheld the level of community by opening up this topic to the forum for input on decisions. I really, really admire that about this forum.

I honestly don't know what to say or to respond with, but if this is something that needs to be decided.. then damn it, I'll scrounge around for what 2 cents I can find.

I think a loose policy is best. More of a guideline than an actual policy with a cautious approach & I agree with Ura that legalities should be considered.
I think that if there is a way we can help, that opportunity should be there, but not to the degree that the forum turns into a support system.
I think that if it's ever discovered that a person is faking it, they should be irrevocably banned to the fullest extent possible.

It's almost impossible to actually get a legal solution out of anything that happens online. There are legal codes that are theoretically able to be invoked, but you don't need to look far to see these being ignored in favor of red tape. Getting a letter from a legal firm is just a threat tactic, and the likelihood of actually getting in trouble (even if someone were saying "Oh just go ahead and do it you moron!") is almost negligible.

This is the Internet. We're in the same pool as Reddit here people. You can say what you like and there is way more chance that the moderators will take action than anything else happening off-line.

To be fair, there are Terms of Service somewhere to which we all agreed when we registered. If it's prohibited, enforce a ban, give a warning, edit the content, etc.. Do whatever it is you've already agreed to do. If you're afraid of the liability, which is real albeit a far-off chance of being invoked, just do as he demanded and ban the creep. It won't be missed. Notifying mental health or law enforcement is getting far too personal.

I think if someone says they are going to off themselves. it should be no different than saying they are going to off someone else. Why announce it? A cry for attention? Warn them to edit their post and that is not tolerated here, then ban them if they do it again. This is not a hotline, this is the internet, and people seeking attention are not going to get any, as the internet is just an IP address, anyone can claim anything.

For nearly 20 years I meditated on and studied that which has no name, but is absolute, infinite, beyond both small and large. Finally one day I realized the limits of my sentient consciousness. It has all power over whether we are it or dual. There is no choice of the nondual, for choice is dual. Just be, live, do what you will, with love and wisdom. As Hermes said, in a time yet unborn, all shall be one, and one shall be all. True enlightenment has nothing to do with attainment. It's an inner peace, that there is nothing to be done, I call it surrender to the Spirit.

I like this. I think we're mature enough to talk about suicidal feelings and suggest resources for members in need. However, threats or affirmative statements of intending to commit suicide or homicide should be worthy of a ban and a report to local law enforcement if possible. This should be well known to all members, so hopefully that situation will be prevented.

edit - I understand that trolling happens, but that goes back to the question, 'what kind of forum do we want this to be?'

Edited by jes, 02 April 2014 - 11:58 AM.

It doesn't matter what they say, in the jealous games people play - The Go-Gos

For my will is as strong as yours, and my kingdom is as great.... you have no power over me.

While this seems like an incredibly difficult dilemma, I've the perfect solution. We ask them to donate their body to our metaphysical endeavors: the flesh for binding books, bones for carving, organs for whatever one can conceive. I'll get the bones, naturally, seeing as how I'm currently working with said material and will need more...wouldn't mind some of the epidermis either. Regardless, I believe this to be an excellent solution to the problem at hand!

In all seriousness, simply providing them with various professional sources that could help with their problem would suffice. Typically, if someone publicly presents their desire to commit suicide, it's a ruse geared towards obtaining attention unless they're simply stating that they feel suicidal and seek help to prevent it. Basically, whenever it's used as a threat...it's, more often than not, an attention seeking tactic with no true intent behind the words. I'd almost go as far as to say those types should be ignored...because actually catering to this type of behavior makes it worse. Those who actually seek out help rather than threaten are normally the ones you truly have to worry about, in which case...I'd recommend being an ear to talk to and providing more professional places that could properly help them deal with the issues at hand.

That's a careless assumption and it mustn't be allowed to stand in print without challenge, even if moderated by a more often than not statement. It's not empirically supported in the slightest way. There's no dearth of research in this area so we don't have to guess about it, use common sense, or rely on population opinion: there's data. Statistically speaking, people who express thoughts about committing suicide in any form, including overt threats of imminent action, are about 30 times more likely to kill themselves than those who don't express any such thoughts. In epidemiological terms, a factor of 30 is utterly massive.

Looked at from another angle and depending on the source, at least 50% and as much as 75% of people who actually attempt suicide talked about it beforehand. In the context of online communities, we're limited to what people say. By and large, other potential signs of suicide risk are not available, but seeing one risk factor is better than seeing none, if we as a community care enough to try to help people that come here and might need help. There's nothing at all that can be done for people who never express a desire to kill themselves but then try, but if someone does say something about it, there are things we might do, and some of those things might help someone, sometime. And for me, it's worth the effort.

Tenebrae, on 02 April 2014 - 01:44 PM, said:

I'd almost go as far as to say those types should be ignored...because actually catering to this type of behavior makes it worse.

It isn't stated, and I doubt you feel this way T, but this statement implies that it's preferable to avoid giving attention seekers attention (which might make their attention seeking worse, which would of course annoy us more) than to err on the side of caution and reach out to people who have presented a risk factor for dying in the near future. I think the better default calculation goes something like this: even if the ratio was 10:1 attention seekers to future suicide attempters (which the data shows is not the case at all), I think it's worth the risk of supporting attention seeking for even a small chance of helping the one person who really is about to kill themselves.

You don't have to be a bleeding heart liberal to understand why a community ought to err on the side of caution on a topic like this. There but for the grace of God go I... where the word "go" = death. It's not likely that everyone who kills themselves always felt like dying, or knows they're going to do it all of their lives. What might foster that desire in any given individual is impossible to predict. Every one of us can assume that there's some set of circumstances that might foster that desire in us someday. And if we ever do go there, and someone reaches out and helps us get past it..., therein lies the power of our social drives. Caring for each other is caring for ourselves.

That's not to say that everyone can be helped, that preventing a near future attempt will prevent all future attempts, etc. Some people never feel "right" and it doesn't matter what anyone else says to them or does to help them. But that's not reason to not try, because some people on the brink are helped, get past feeling suicidal, and do come to feel okay about living the rest of their natural lives.

From what I can tell, just about every long-standing suicide prevention organization and all of the major social media sites are well aware of the trends in online suicide threats and their relationship to attempts and completions. Everyone's trying to respond to it. I suggest that admin look at the history of threats on Facebook, Facebook's response, and what the national suicide prevention organizations have to say about the Facebook phenomena.

I'll check in with my clinical colleagues to get opinions and then share them here.

That's a careless assumption and it mustn't be allowed to stand in print without challenge, even if moderated by a more often than not statement. It's not empirically supported in the slightest way. There's no dearth of research in this area so we don't have to guess about it, use common sense, or rely on population opinion: there's data. Statistically speaking, people who express thoughts about committing suicide in any form, including overt threats of imminent action, are about 30 times more likely to kill themselves than those who don't express any such thoughts. In epidemiological terms, a factor of 30 is utterly massive.

Looked at from another angle and depending on the source, at least 50% and as much as 75% of people who actually attempt suicide talked about it beforehand. In the context of online communities, we're limited to what people say. By and large, other potential signs of suicide risk are not available, but seeing one risk factor is better than seeing none, if we as a community care enough to try to help people that come here and might need help. There's nothing at all that can be done for people who never express a desire to kill themselves but then try, but if someone does say something about it, there are things we might do, and some of those things might help someone, sometime. And for me, it's worth the effort.

...and what exactly are these statistics including, those who slice their wrist without the proper direction so that they are then found and whisked away to the hospital? Those who have a huge fight with a loved one, lock themselves in a room, and then swallow a bottle of pills knowing full well that the door will be taken down and their stomach pumped at the hospital? I would be willing to bet money that these statistics are including these particular situations...which I, personally, don't consider attempted suicide. If you truly want to kill yourself, you don't let people know about it and you don't use it as a threat...you just do it. It's not difficult to end your life.

In my personal experience, which is admittedly biased, it's those who don't speak out about their desires to end their lives that actually do it, or those who do...but are genuinely asking for help. For example, an old school friend of mine...she didn't discuss her issues with anyone, she just decided to take a shotgun to her face one day because of her boyfriend being absolute trash. Completely unexpected...and absolutely no chance for anyone to come along and take her to the hospital. She decided she wanted to die, and she carried it out in a way that ensured that outcome.

My current roommate is suicidal, a very logical atheist who believes you simply cease to exist upon death and finds her life a bit too intolerable to deal with at times. She knows that this is due to mental problems and actively seeks to change them...but finds that they build up over time and get the better of her. Despite this, there are times where she uses suicide as a threat in order to gain comfort during a time of great stress...times where she has absolutely no true intention of actually doing it. She has admitted to this after calming down. Her and I both know that if she wanted to commit suicide...there's no way I could stop her from doing it; she would decide how to do it...and do it. Telling me about her plan to commit suicide is counter-productive and nothing more than a threat with no actual intent...used as a means to gain comfort.

Does that mean she's not suicidal? No...but it means that I don't take her seriously when she's using it as a threat to obtain comfort during a time when she's just stressed out and I have no reason to. Those times are when I don't have to worry about her committing suicide because she's telling me, which are times when she's just using it for attention by her own words...and many are like this. I take her seriously when she's actually talking to me about how she can't find a psychiatrist in South Carolina because they're all Christians or not intelligent enough to deal with her, which I agree with because she's a very intelligent girl. These are times when she's not using suicide as a threat, she's actively trying to help herself because she knows that her problems are a psychological issue and they're becoming unbearable. These are the times when she's actually at risk and not simply seeking attention, but actual help.

When you give into the threats, it becomes a habit for these individuals to continue using suicide as a method to gain sympathy and attention...so they'll resort to it much more often. This, unto itself, is toxic because it makes this an ingrained personality trait...and who wants to deal with someone that's constantly threatening suicide for attention? Now, you have an individual who has lost their primary method of gaining attention because no one wants to deal with them anymore. That's when they actually do become suicidal, which may even contribute to those statistics that you're talking about.

R. Eugene Laughlin, on 02 April 2014 - 04:48 PM, said:

It isn't stated, and I doubt you feel this way T, but this statement implies that it's preferable to avoid giving attention seekers attention (which might make their attention seeking worse, which would of course annoy us more) than to err on the side of caution and reach out to people who have presented a risk factor for dying in the near future. I think the better default calculation goes something like this: even if the ratio was 10:1 attention seekers to future suicide attempters (which the data shows is not the case at all), I think it's worth the risk of supporting attention seeking for even a small chance of helping the one person who really is about to kill themselves.

You don't have to be a bleeding heart liberal to understand why a community ought to err on the side of caution on a topic like this. There but for the grace of God go I... where the word "go" = death. It's not likely that everyone who kills themselves always felt like dying, or knows they're going to do it all of their lives. What might foster that desire in any given individual is impossible to predict. Every one of us can assume that there's some set of circumstances that might foster that desire in us someday. And if we ever do go there, and someone reaches out and helps us get past it..., therein lies the power of our social drives. Caring for each other is caring for ourselves.

That's not to say that everyone can be helped, that preventing a near future attempt will prevent all future attempts, etc. Some people never feel "right" and it doesn't matter what anyone else says to them or does to help them. But that's not reason to not try, because some people on the brink are helped, get past feeling suicidal, and do come to feel okay about living the rest of their natural lives.

From what I can tell, just about every long-standing suicide prevention organization and all of the major social media sites are well aware of the trends in online suicide threats and their relationship to attempts and completions. Everyone's trying to respond to it. I suggest that admin look at the history of threats on Facebook, Facebook's response, and what the national suicide prevention organizations have to say about the Facebook phenomena.

I'll check in with my clinical colleagues to get opinions and then share them here.

Actually,

That's sort of exactly what I'm implying with my words because providing the attention can be equally as toxic. For those who are using suicide as a threat, giving into the ruse causes them to adopt this as an ingrained personality trait that they can then use to supplement actual help with the psychological issues they suffer through the short term fix of the attention they receive. Ultimately, people get tired of dealing with someone who uses suicide as a threat...and this individual finds themselves unable to obtain that attention through the means which they have now adopted as a core personality trait. The depression worsens, and now suicide is no longer a ruse...it's all they have left. They now have committed suicide because people encouraged bad behavior...

This is why the only responsible thing to do would be provide official sources for them to go to in order to seek help and potentially offer and ear for those who actually DO seem to be actively seeking out help rather than threatening suicide.

I guess it seems a bit cold only because it seems difficult for most to judge between when someone is using suicide as a threat and when they're legitimately asking for help. Actually, with that said...those who threaten suicide could be subjected to the notification of the authorities because those individuals need help...but not in the form of feeding them the attention they're seeking.

Either way, just my opinion on the matter...which is what was asked for.

The research isn't hiding. It's easy to find if you want to assess it for yourself. There are mountains of studies available. I suggest that anyone interested start with national suicide prevention organizations. Virtually all programs you'll find are evidence-based. Here's where a lot of them get some of their information:

How many people in the history of this forum have said they were going to kill themselves? It has happened, but I sincerely doubt having some type of policy in place will result in droves of potentially suicidal people suddenly appearing, or the forum transforming into some odd mix of occult and suicide prevention.

I believe that when it has happened, the forum has risen to the occasion and responded in a personalized way due in part because of the infrequency of such an occurrence and, to memory, these people were familiar to us. People we've had strange, internet based relationships with sometimes for several years. Sometimes over a decade. They are inter-friends, people that some have come to know on other mediums and some perhaps even in person. Suffice it to say, despite the number of members this forum has, it's still a fairly tight-knit group; a community.

This is one of the reasons why I feel a cautious, yet friendly approach should be taken. An approach that takes individual instances into consideration and why I would prefer a loose structure for any policy, as I said, more of a guideline than anything else. The other reason I feel this way is because I believe that the majority of posters here are genuinely kind, friendly people. We all have our idiosyncrasies, naturally, but by and large there is a tendency toward respectful conduct and genuine interest in one another's progress as living beings.

As for the "self help" aspect.. ..I find it incredibly interesting that in this forum, we discuss ideas and concepts, exchange ideas and information all in the - and sometimes bluntly stated - goal of making our lives better, with the goal of becoming healthier, happier and more aware individuals. Empowered people. People with the skill and confidence to take control of our lives, ourselves and shape for ourselves the reality that suits us best... and there is no degree of 'self help' to this forum? Ok.

It doesn't seem that long ago when I was going through a bad time when my bf died. I came on here and spoke in a blog post about a few of the things happening. That in itself was a great pressure release, sometimes talking to strangers over the internet is the only option a person might consider themselves to have. I never expected anyone to reply. But people did, with such kind words and offers of prayer.

I will admit now that I was in a really bad place and at one point I came close to ending it. It may seem small and insignificant but every single reply and kind words I received at that time helped me in ways I can't express with words. I am so grateful for that, I truly don't think I would be alive now if it weren't for you lot.

The point I want to make is, if I had expressed that I was feeling suicidal rather then just talking about things and then hadn't received the support I got or had got banned or something, I might not be here now.

My advice is to cover things in whatever way is needed for legal obligations and then trust the community to handle things. As a whole I don't think we do a bad job.

There is no such thing as ugliness there are only prejudiced eyes.

It is the wise person who looks not only from the height as an eagle or from the depths as a fish but from the view of an ant or an elephant and everything in between, but an even wiser person remembers there own perspective must not be ignored less you miss the beauty that is within you or perhaps that tiger creeping up from behind.

Tenebrae, If there is any chance whatsoever- and of course there always is- of someone actually doing it, then we must assume the threat is genuine. Not to do so would be a bit of a dick move. As an entity, the OC must avoid dick moves- it has to be nice. When I moderate, I axe myself what Buddha would do, and I would be even if my personal ethics resembled those of Hannibal Lecter because my function as a moderator is to keep shit together and make things better for everyone, if that makes sense.

REL, you deserve a high five and a gold star for actually bringing data to this conversation. Thank you.

Whether we choose to call this 'an occult forum not a self help forum' isn't going to have any effect whatsoever on the fact that people can and do use it for more than talking about how to ensorcle things. We must accept that and do what we can to actually help, IMO.

This is a postcard sent from the dining room of the HMS Russel's Teapot. Wish you were here- the band is spot on tonight, and we're having "all the way down" turtle soup!

Have the mods gone through each thread with threats of suicide in it and analysed how the conversation went? I think if they did they would see sarcasm and strange obscure comments. Think how it would sound to a law enforcer going through it after someone had killed themselves. We are bound to be a community that gives eccentric replies but I don't think the place for them is in a conversation with threats of suicide.A good policy would be to post the official advice-giving comments that have been agreed instead of (or at least as well as) what is there already.

Just because you cannot save people from themselves DOES NOT mean you can't be a friend and care which I think most of us do.Also just be cause we care does not mean we are a suicide hot line or counselors trained to give advice is that something you feel the OC should even be involved in? Helping out a friend or someone on here is different then opening up this community too attract those in need of real help.